


Holiday Misgivings

by Zippit



Series: gameofcards prompts [2]
Category: Code Black (TV)
Genre: Established Relationship, Fluff, Gen, M/M, Mangus - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-22
Updated: 2015-12-22
Packaged: 2018-05-08 11:08:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 920
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5494955
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zippit/pseuds/Zippit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mario's going home for the holidays with a lot on his mind.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Holiday Misgivings

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the prompt "circle" for a [team_spades](http://team_spades.livejournal.com) only battle between phases 6 and 7 of [gameofcards](http://gameofcards.livejournal.com).

Mario stares at the screen telling him the flight’s on time and it’s estimated arrival time with dread squeezing his chest so very tight. His gray, department store peacoat’s draped over the back of the stiff backed cloth chair he’s slumped in while the long sleeved black shirt and worn jeans are an attempt at feeling comfortable about all of this. There’s a battered green duffel bag dropped at his feet stuffed full of clothes and the few presents he needed. Next to it is a roller suitcase with its handle popped and a piece of clothing that laughingly calls itself a sweatshirt, it’s so thin. But it’s comfort soft. He knows that for a fact and he forgives its wearer some of the bullshit of calling it a sweatshirt.

He forces his hand to relax, the long not quite tissue thin paper that’s his boarding pass needs to survive til they board. Dropping it on top of his duffel, he reaches for the overpriced water he’d been talked into buying and the click of the top unscrewing shouldn’t be audible. He chokes down a sip of tasteless water. He’s still not used to the slightly metallic tang of the L.A. city water. Better at tolerating it sure but not enough where he still doesn’t reach for something else first. He wipes his mouth with the back of his hand and looks up when Angus, dressed much the same as him in jeans and a dark green long sleeved shirt, drops into the seat next to him with a grin. “Lighten up. For someone going home, you look like you’re being sent to death row instead.”

Mario rolls his eyes and watches as Angus pulls out a bag of Cheetos from the front pocket of his suitcase. “Shut up.” He doesn’t need to explain to Angus exactly why going home is layered with a mix of so many emotions he’d almost rather not go home. But an edict from his grandmother nixed that plan pretty much from the get go. And when Angus had heard about Grandma telling him he needed to bring whoever he was seeing with him, well, things had gone downhill from there.

“C’mon, it can’t be that bad.” Angus leans back, stretching his legs in front of him, as he eats several Cheetos. “Your grandma sounds like a lady I’d want to get to know.” He arches an eyebrow at him, with that delighted glint that’s made his eyes glow since he’d declared he was going home to New York with Mario. “She managed to drag you back with only a single conversation.”

He scowls at Angus. Grandma isn’t one you disappoint. She was the one that believed in him, the one that fronted him the money here and there when he was so tired he dropped on his feet and couldn’t make his shift at the bar that night. Money for food, money to survive one week to the next. She’d done more than his good for nothing parents had ever done and he wasn’t going to do anything to be ungrateful. Even if that meant dragging his sorry ass back to New York when it was the last thing he wanted to do. “I’m warning you again, it’s not the bed of roses your family is.”

He hadn’t met the Leighton family yet. All he knew was that Angus’ dad was on the board, his brother had been a superstar when he went through the program, and Angus himself had switched from psych to emergency medicine. Really, what was Mario doing hanging out with a guy from that kind of family? A guy that could do so much better. He tunes back into the moment when he’s elbowed none too gently. “Stop it. I have a pretty good idea of what I’m getting into. And I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.”

Angus gives him one of those significant looks of his. All wide brown eyes, feelings written across his face, and a determined tilt to his mouth. He also never knows when to quit. This…thing between them wasn’t even supposed to be a thing. The idiot kept poking at him, kept making him open up, and actually managed to see everything he tried to keep from showing. Like the fact he wanted to fit in with the other residents but his people skills were so shitty he didn’t want to deal with rejection so he rejected them first.

“Yeah, whatever, dude,” Mario says but without much bite to it. Taking someone home was…he didn’t do it. There just wasn’t a point. The people that knew him, that knew his past, they didn’t believe in his new life. Most of them still thought it was a joke while the ones that believed it wouldn’t understand where he came from. He rubbed at his eyes then recapped the water bottle before rolling it in his hands. He needed something to do. Instead of focusing on the arrival time and the jumpiness building in him telling him to get out of here. That the last thing he needed was to cross his two worlds. That it’d just end in pain. But Angus had been unrelenting in asking about Grandma and what she was like and what Mario’s favorite memories were until he’d finally caved and told him in exasperation he could come. He just hopes things don’t go down in flames like they normally do when it comes to a Savetti family gathering.


End file.
